On June 26, 2019, Oritani Financial Corp., Township of Washington, New Jersey, the holding company for Oritani Bank, and Valley National Bancorp, Wayne, New Jersey, the holding company for Valley National Bank, announced the execution of a definitive merger agreement pursuant to which Oritani will merge with and into Valley, with Valley as the resulting company. Oritani shareholders will receive 1.6 shares of Valley common stock for each share of Oritani common stock. The total merger consideration is currently valued at approximately $740 million. The current Chairman, President and CEO of Oritani, Kevin J. Lynch, is expected to join the Boards of Directors of Valley National Bancorp and Valley National Bank at the close of the merger.

Luse Gorman is serving as legal counsel to Oritani in the transaction. The Luse Gorman team consists of John J. Gorman, Marc P. Levy and Greg Sobczak (Corporate/M&A), and Jeffrey M. Cardone and Beverly J. White (Executive Compensation).

Oritani has approximately $4.1 billion in assets and operates from its main office and 25 full-service branch offices in the New Jersey counties of Bergen, Hudson, Essex and Passaic.

Valley has approximately $32.5 billion in assets and operates over 200 branches in New Jersey, New York, Florida and Alabama.